Being brief... and getting it done
Being brief
I am terrible at writing to a prompt.
For some reason, when given one, my brain first freezes and then starts working in overdrive: what does this prompt mean? Where should I start? How much do I need to write? When will this be over? Why?!
And quite often prompts lead writers to create the most wonderful short stories.
I do not think I am destined as a writer of short stories. And yet, I realise that I used to read them much more than I do now.
The one that sticks with me the most from that time is Shirley Jackson's The Lottery. That in fewer than 3,500 words she manages to create such intrigue, mystery, and then horror means this story will always hold me in its sway.
We read it in school, perhaps aged around 14-15 years old, and it has haunted me ever since.
Around the same time, I also read The Tell-Tale Heart and The Masque of the Red Death, both by Edgar Allan Poe, and yet again, I was haunted by them.
Shortly after that, my English teacher decided that it was time for The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman.
You might understand why, after that batch of tales, I tried not to read short stories for a long while. Actively avoided them, in fact.
It wasn't until I got married that I returned to reading short stories. I had bought My Mistress's Sparrow Is Dead: Great Love Stories, from Chekhov to Munro, a collection of short love stories edited by Jeffrey Eugenides. And I fell in love with short stories that didn't have the ability to scar me for life.
And then, a couple of years ago, we were assigned Ett halvt ark papper by August Strindberg to read and analyse in Swedish class. And I just adored that story. Called Half a Sheet of Foolscap or A Half Sheet of Paper, it is well worth the read in English (and here is the original, if you read Swedish).
But somehow, I always seem to return to the spooky (and the classics) when I read short stories, a couple of recent favourites being The Monkey's Paw by W.W. Jacobs and The Signal-Man by Charles Dickens.
I blame my English teachers for setting me on this macabre reading path.
What I've been up to recently
And now on to the "getting it done" part of the newsletter.
Yes, I am very nearly almost done with the first draft of the novel. (Finally! you cry, What took you so long?)
And yes, I know that my last however many newsletters have also made the same claim, but this time I mean it. Truly.
To be honest, I had been going round and round in a circle (and not even of the ever-decreasing kind), and getting nowhere, writing and deleting, and writing and deleting. But then I had lunch with a fellow author (who also reads this newsletter [waves]) and was telling her my woes.
Catherine pointed out a very simple solution to my issue with the ending of the novel, and it all just slipped into place. She sent me back to my desk with strict instructions to write the almost final scene of the book - the one I'd been struggling with for a couple of months - and not care about what state it was in and NOT TAMPER WITH THE START OF THE NOVEL. And I followed her to the letter (well, almost).
I wrote that scene - dreadfully, awfully, terribly, in all its Sh*tty First Draft glory. And then I stuck up bright orange Post-It notes to the wall above my desk, each one of the 12 being a scene that I needed to finalise.
I've been working my way through them and now I have only nine to go (and two of those are very nearly there).
There is something ever so pleasurable about peeling those Post-Its off the wall, screwing them up, and throwing them in the bin.
And now, there are just six gracing the wall.
Watch this space.
What I've been reading recently
Beneath a Scarlet Sky - Mark T. Sullivan: Where to begin with this one? Probably with the fact that I found it quite poorly written, and secondly, largely unbelievable. A young boy helps rescue Jews and take them over the mountains into Switzerland, meets Mussolini (on more than one occasion) and is the personal driver to one of the most high-ranking Nazis in Italy? And any paperwork or people to corroborate his story is lacking because the papers were burned and the people are now sadly dead? I'm not buying it, I'm afraid. I don't mean I don't believe any of it, but it all seems a little too unbelievable. But then, Mark Twain did say that truth is stranger than fiction.
The Secret of Summerhayes - Merryn Allingham: A Second World War book set in Sussex and featuring Canadian soldiers? Umm, could this be any more up my street? (Also, although the house of Summerhayes itself is fictional, the neighbouring "big house", Amberley, is somewhere I've visited, so I really enjoyed the scenes set there.) I enjoyed this, although it did stretch belief just a little towards the end. I also found the very last scene a bit disappointing after the drama before it, but I think it might have been set up that way to allow for a sequel. (Also, Merryn Allingham's author website is brilliant, and she offers extra details on this area of Sussex, which is fascinating.)
The Return [After The War - US title] - Anita Frank: I LOVED this. So much so, that I sped through the last 15% of it, as I had to find out what happened, and then went back and reread those pages at the slower pace later to savour them. This novel tells the story of Jack and Gwen and their marriage told in two timelines: 1939 and immediately after the end of the war.
Moon Tiger - Penelope Lively: I don't know why I have never read this book before, but I am so glad that I have now. Claudia Hampton is a prickly old woman living in a nursing home thinking back over her incredible life. I won't say more, as I wouldn't want to spoil it, but the writing is rich and lush and the story charming and surprising in equal measure.
What I've been watching recently
Catch-22 (2019): A remake of the 1970 film based on the 1961 novel by Joseph Heller about the trials and tribulations of Yossarian, a B-25 bombardier who is constantly fighting against the Catch-22 policy the military uses to justify its position. There is no way out of its circular argument, and seemingly no way out for Yossarian, either. Throughout this series, you're laughing one minute and horrified the next. I really enjoyed it (although I'm not sure what that says about me). The book is not one that I have read, but perhaps I'll rectify that now.
Until the next time,
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